


someday is a story, and it's the one i'm sticking to

by kinkywrists



Category: Chinese Actor RPF, 陈情令 | The Untamed (TV) RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Baker Xiao Zhan, Future Fic, Idol Wang Yi Bo, M/M, References to Homophobia, references to 227
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-17 06:41:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29467437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kinkywrists/pseuds/kinkywrists
Summary: When Xiao Zhan sets the coffee on one of the tables by the window, Yibo looks down at the cups and chuckles, all low and warm. Yibo’s laugh has always been so at odds with the stoic and calm persona he sells, something sweet. Xiao Zhan still remembers the first time he heard Yibo laugh properly, when Xiao Zhan flubbed his lines during the script reading, little croaking giggles ringing in his ears. It hadn’t been a life-changing event — Xiao Zhan’s life isn’t divided into before and after hearing Yibos laugh — except that it is, just a little. Before Yibo, after Yibo. Before The Untamed, after whatever the mess that happened after was. Yibo being here right now fucks up the entire concept ofafterYibo.---The last person Xiao Zhan expects to see in his bakery, ten years into his retirement from entertainment, is Wang Yibo.
Relationships: Wang Yi Bo/Xiao Zhan
Comments: 39
Kudos: 346





	someday is a story, and it's the one i'm sticking to

**Author's Note:**

> a huge thank you to [eternitysky](https://archiveofourown.org/users/eternitysky/pseuds/eternitysky) and [martialartist816](https://archiveofourown.org/users/martialartist816/pseuds/martialartist816) for betaing and cheering me on on this for like half a year! You guys are absolutely invaluable to me both in writing and also in being aces in general!!!
> 
> small disclaimer: while I tried to keep everything quite vague, there is some discussion of the c-ent industry, and a brief mention of coming out as gay as a public figure. I tried my best to not be clumsy with it, but with such a heavy subject, and also with an industry that I have very little knowledge of, it's inevitable that I've got some things wrong. If there's anything glaring, feel free to message me/comment it below, otherwise please forgive any errors!

Xiao Zhan raises the shutter of _Little Rabbit_ bakery with practised ease, the metal clanging as noisily as ever. It’s a bright Tuesday morning and everything is running according to plan; the first batch of bread is due to finish baking in fifteen minutes, and even his most eager regulars don’t usually turn up until at least seven a.m., which gives him a good half hour before anyone shows up. 

He heads back inside the bakery and puts the door on the latch, just in case someone is feeling particularly eager for an early morning coffee before the bread is finished, because Xiao Zhan is nothing if not considerate. It’s pleasantly warm inside, the spring sun coming through the large windows just so, illuminating the little dust motes speckling the air, and Xiao Zhan rolls up the sleeves of his pale blue sweater before pulling on his apron. 

He makes himself a huge mug of green tea and flops down into the chair next to the counter, pulling out his phone. Weibo at six-thirty-something on a Tuesday morning isn’t exactly lively, but it passes the time. There are a few familiar faces coming up on his personal following list; Ayanga’s new album is just as popular as anticipated, and Li Qin has posted a few holiday snaps of somewhere sunny and abroad. It doesn’t take him long to catch up with the evening’s activity, and Xiao Zhan sips his tea and looks out the window, watching the world wake up in small increments; the lights coming on in the storefront opposite, the distant sound of cars growing louder, the call of voices somewhere down the street.

The early morning peace is interrupted by the sound of a motorbike pulling up outside the front of the bakery. Xiao Zhan _tsks_ at the inconsiderate revving so early in the morning and watches the motorcyclist hop off the bike and tug off their helmet through the window, the sunlight causing them to be little more than a dark silhouette backlit against Chongqing streets. They hesitate for a bit outside the front of the bakery, take a look at the signs in the windows and then back down at their phone, and Xiao Zhan braces himself for a polite conversation with a fan. An inconsiderate fan who doesn’t know what time it is, apparently.

However, he doesn't brace himself to see Wang Yibo striding in through the door of his bakery in full biking gear, black helmet tucked under one arm. 

Xiao Zhan can feel himself staring, but he feels like it’s an extremely valid response to unexpectedly seeing someone he hasn't spoken to in three years, hasn't seen in person for five, and is also still incredibly famous. Yibo looks every part the singer-cum-model-cum-presenter-cum-idol that he is, and even barefaced with helmet tousled hair, he is indescribably handsome. The thick motorbike boots and leather jacket just make him look more like something from a magazine, more untouchable, and Xiao Zhan feels horribly underdressed in his flour-dusted pants and apron. 

“Xiao Zhan,” Wang Yibo says breathlessly when he reaches the counter. “Hi.”

He grins his familiar heart-shaped grin and Xiao Zhan, embarrassingly, feels a little starstruck. 

Xiao Zhan bows his head a little, unfamiliar but polite. “Wang Yibo,” he greets, “long time no see.” 

“Has it been long?” Yibo asks, setting his helmet on the countertop. “A few years, right?”

In fact, the last time that they’d seen each other was at a New Year’s party five years ago when Xiao Zhan had just bought the bakery, still an empty building at the time. Yibo had smiled wide and said that he was pleased for Xiao Zhan, and had then had coolly mentioned that he’s also opening up a chain of skatewear stores across Beijing and Shanghai. Xiao Zhan had wanted to say _it’s not the same, it doesn’t belong to you, does anything in your life belong to you?_ but instead he’d congratulated him and said that he’d be sure to visit one once they opened. Yibo hadn’t said that he’d visit Xiao Zhan’s bakery, and Xiao Zhan hadn’t minded. Xiao Zhan hadn’t really intended to visit any of Yibo’s skatewear stores either.

“Yeah, something around that,” Xiao Zhan hedges, feeling very out of place behind the counter. He kind of wants to come around to the other side to put them both on more equal footing, but he’s honestly just so blindsided by the fact that Yibo is even _here_ that he finds himself rooted to the spot.

Yibo laughs and rests one elbow on the countertop to casually prop himself up, his leather jacket squeaking against the varnished wood. “It’s been busy. You know how it gets.” 

Xiao Zhan doesn’t know how it gets, not any more. He knows how it got, back when he was a small-time idol, having the time of his life singing his heart out on stage with his band mates. He knows how it got, sweating through his clothes through period drama boot-camp, during endless days of shooting in the sweltering heat. 

He knows how it got, skyrocketing overnight, left with less than a year of dramas and endorsements piling at his feet. More sponsors than he knew that to do with, more work than he could physically handle, the gut-turning feeling of running up and up and up with everything you build collapsing down around you, the lurch of one missed step and then tumbling all the way back down.

No, Xiao Zhan doesn’t know how it gets. 

“Are you here filming? I could have sworn I heard that you were supposed to be filming right now,” Xiao Zhan says instead of any of the bitter retorts that sit on his tongue. Yibo must be busy; he’s a host for the weekly show that Xiao Zhan watches on Wednesday nights, and Xiao Zhan is sure that he had read that he’s rumoured to be starring in a modern drama that should be filming now. He’s on three different billboards that Xiao Zhan can see from his bedroom window above the bakery. He’s busy enough that he shouldn’t have time to pop in and chat with an old coworker, let alone Xiao Zhan.

“Yup,” Yibo says simply, turning his face to the side to look out the front windows and _god_ , the years have been good to him. The stubborn baby fat that clung to his face deep into his twenties has given way to a sharp jawline with prominent cheekbones, masculine and handsome. Xiao Zhan has gained back some of his weight since he’s been retired, but privately thinks that round cheeks have always suited him better than the chiselled cheekbones bourne of too-many period dramas. He doesn’t quite feel self-conscious, but a tiny part of him hopes that Yibo thinks it suits him too. “I thought I’d pop by while I’ve got the chance.”

Yibo turns back to look at Xiao Zhan and he stares, his intense gaze looking like he’s searching Xiao Zhan’s face, wanting for something. 

“Well, I’m humbled to have you,” Xiao Zhan says and turns behind him to grab two teacups, hoping that it doesn’t look obvious that he’s avoiding eye contact. “Would you like a coffee?”

“Please.”

Xiao Zhan feels a little awkward as he messes with the coffee machine, and a little ashamed that he remembers exactly how Yibo takes his coffee and doesn't even ask how he wants it before he starts frothing the milk. It’s strange to have tiny pieces of intimate knowledge about Yibo – who is now practically a stranger to him – hidden in his mind. It’s strange to have him in Xiao Zhan’s space without a word of warning and such a flimsy excuse. The last time he felt this off-kilter just from seeing someone was over a decade ago, when he ran into an ex who started crying at him in public, holding onto his arm while onlookers stared. He doesn’t want to think too deeply about why it is that he remembers her now. Xiao Zhan hadn’t made Yibo cry once.

Wang Yibo stands in the middle of the room, predictably unaware of Xiao Zhan’s internal struggle, and looks around the cafe, appraising. The big windows let in a lot of light, and it’s in a nice area of the city. Xiao Zhan hopes he approves. He _wants_ Yibo to approve, he realises. He wants someone who used to know him to say that, actually, he hasn’t done too badly, considering the way things were. It’s been years since he’s wanted anyone’s approval but his parents’, and the realisation shocks him a little. He just about manages to keep his hands from shaking as he brings the coffees over.

When Xiao Zhan sets the coffee on one of the tables by the window, Yibo looks down at the cups and chuckles, all low and warm. Yibo’s laugh has always been so at odds with the stoic and calm persona he sells, something sweet. Xiao Zhan still remembers the first time he heard Yibo laugh properly, when Xiao Zhan flubbed his lines during the script reading, little croaking giggles ringing in his ears. It hadn’t been a life-changing event — Xiao Zhan’s life isn’t divided into before and after hearing Yibos laugh — except that it is, just a little. Before Yibo, after Yibo. Before The Untamed, after whatever the mess that happened after was. Yibo being here right now fucks up the entire concept of _after_ Yibo.

“I’ve seen photos of these online. Cute.” Yibo points to the little bunny logo that Xiao Zhan mindlessly stencilled into the coffee foam, little hearts surrounding it. Xiao Zhan – absurdly – feels his ears prickle with heat. “Do you still draw?” Yibo slides into one of the wooden chairs at the table, gesturing for Xiao Zhan to join him. 

“I do, every now and again. I have a lot more time for it now. I actually designed all of the logos and merchandise here,” Xiao Zhan sits and gestures at the embroidery on his apron – a loaf of bread in the shape of a rabbit, a little gimmicky but still cute and simple – and Yibo peers at the mug in his hand, the repeating pattern also one of Xiao Zhan’s designs.

“Cool.”

Xiao Zhan sits in the chair opposite Yibo, and their knees knock together. It’s a conscious effort for Xiao Zhan to not jolt back. Yibo’s so warm, his entire manner open and familiar, and Xiao Zhan is frustrated that he can’t return it.

“I do a little design on the side, too. Nothing big, just enough to–” _live off of_ , he doesn’t say, “–keep me occupied.”

“It must be nice to have time for things again,” Yibo murmurs, holding the coffee mug in both large hands and looking out the window. Xiao Zhan is glad that it’s quiet; he doesn't want to start seeing customers while Yibo is here, the atmosphere charged and delicate. Xiao Zhan wants to shake him a little and ask him what he’s doing here, or tell him to go away so Xiao Zhan can carry on being nobody at all. Or maybe to ask him to stay just a while longer, and pull together the threads of a lost friendship until they stretch taut between them, drawing them closer to one another, the way things were before. 

They sit together in silence for a short while, and Xiao Zhan turns over thoughts in his head. Any traces of a relationship between them had slowly withered out over the years, as had many of Xiao Zhan’s professional connections in the industry. He doesn’t blame Yibo for any of it, and is truly thankful for his help in eventually getting things cleared up, but he hadn’t expected to ever see him again. Xiao Zhan is a civilian now, someone who used to be famous but has to carry on living and that’s fine. That’s how his life is and it’s _good_.

It’s just that–

Wang Yibo shouldn’t be here. He should be jet setting across the country, meeting with the biggest names in the industry, partying at some high-end club, selling out performance venues, or _anything_ that isn’t having a mug of coffee with Xiao Zhan, awkwardly asking about his life. 

The silence drags between them, suddenly too long, and Xiao Zhan feels his palms sweating against his own mug, discomfort pricking at the nape of his neck. Yibo doesn’t say anything at all, just sips at his coffee looking so completely out of place in his Balenciaga jeans and Chanel rings. The bread will be finished soon, and Xiao Zhan knows that it won’t be long until the first few customers start to trickle in. 

“It’s a nice area,” Yibo says after too long, not looking at him, and Xiao Zhan latches desperately onto the conversation opening, nodding a little manically.

“Yes, it’s quite an expensive area, too. It was really hard to get somewhere that would work, most businesses have been here for years.” 

“Couldn’t you have just bought someone out?” Yibo asks, and it’s a genuine question, asked innocently. Xiao Zhan could have; he probably could have used his name to swing a few things here and there, but that’s not what he was doing here. Even the idea of it sours something in Xiao Zhan’s throat.

“Probably. It wouldn’t have made a good impression with the neighbours though. Not everything can be solved with money, you know.” The words come out a little scolding, and Xiao Zhan bites his tongue to stop anything else from slipping out.

“That’s true.” Yibo turns to him now, a soft smile on his face, not phased at all by Xiao Zhan’s snappish tone. “You like it here, huh?” 

Xiao Zhan nods. “It’s near to my family, and it’s a good city. I’d always planned to move back, just maybe not quite so soon.” 

It hadn’t been a last-minute decision; in fact, getting the bakery was probably one of the most thought out moves in Xiao Zhan’s life. 

Yibo’s smile widens. “You look good,” he says, and Xiao Zhan snorts. Yibo quickly backs up, “I mean, you look the part, you know, with the apron and all.”

Xiao Zhan fiddles with the bow at the front of the apron. “It’s more functional than anything else.” Which is a ridiculous thing to say, because of course, Yibo wasn’t implying anything other than the apron being functional.

Yibo nods, “And the– the coffee? It’s good.” 

Xiao Zhan also nods, and kind of wishes he wasn’t here.

Another silence looms, and Xiao Zhan has to say _something_. He can’t just pretend that Yibo isn’t who he is, so he says, “I watch your show, uh, Wednesday night CCTV 3?”

“Oh!” Yibo looks surprised, “I wouldn’t have thought it would be your thing.”

It’s not, really. Yibo’s hosting skills have improved with age, though, and he’s now a confident senior host, able to easily lead the conversation with the guests whatever the topic. He mostly has it on as background noise while he washes the dishes, but Xiao Zhan doesn’t say as much.

It’s nice, too. To see Yibo settle into something stable, to see him slow down from that 100mph pace he used to hold himself to. To see him grow up, even if it is away from Xiao Zhan and into someone that he doesn’t know.

Yibo is sipping his coffee, and Xiao Zhan realises he hasn’t said anything in response to that. He doesn’t know what to say, his tongue thick in his mouth.

Thirty-eight years of Xiao Zhan being praised for his conversation skills are washed down the drain in the span of a ten-minute conversation with Wang Yibo. Everything that Xiao Zhan wants to say, every conversation topic, is hanging somewhere just out of reach, taunting him. He wonders if this is how other people feel when talking to Yibo. Xiao Zhan never used to feel like this when he talked to him.

“Actually, I’m here–”

Yibo is cut off by the chime of the door, and it’s almost comedic in its timing. Yibo falls silent as if the words he was going to say had been snatched from his throat, his mouth snapping closed.

“Hi, I’ll just be one moment!” Xiao Zhan calls sunnily to the customers who have just walked in, a mother and daughter who are looking over the display case of the various bread rolls. Yibo pushes up and out of his chair almost silently, graceful. For a crazed moment, Xiao Zhan almost wants to ask him to stay. _Why is he here?_

There’s an excited whispered exchange between the customers, and Xiao Zhan knows that Yibo has been recognised. It always was harder for them to go undercover when together, as if seeing them as a pair made them all the more recognisable, somehow. He just hopes that it won’t end up on Weibo hot search, Yibo doesn’t need that.

“Yibo–“ he starts, voice lowered, but Yibo cuts him a crooked smile, putting a hand on Xiao Zhan’s shoulder.

“I have to get going anyway, but it’s been good to catch up, even if it has to be cut short.” Yibo’s whole demeanour has shifted into something colder, more haughty, and Xiao Zhan can feel the pieces of the impassive wall coming back up around him, slipping into his public persona. 

Xiao Zhan stands and Yibo gives him a dismissive nod and doesn’t even glance at the customers as he strides over to grab his helmet, tugging it on before he leaves the bakery. His bike roars to life and he rides off, Xiao Zhan resists the urge to watch him leave.

It’s not until long after he closes for the night that Xiao Zhan realises that Wang Yibo didn’t even pay for his drink.

\- - -

Xiao Zhan is reading in bed when his phone lights up beside him, a WeChat notification on the screen. He flicks open the message with his thumb and isn’t totally surprised that it's a message from Yibo, but it still makes him feel a little excited. _Wang Yibo_ , messaging him while he’s in bed. It feels like 2018.

[wang tian tian]  
_i didnt pay for my coffee_

Xiao Zhan had forgotten that Yibo is still saved under that nickname. It cements just how long it had been since they’d spoken. He doubts that Yibo would appreciate it if he knew, but he also doesn’t want to change it. It makes it feel like they’re closer than they are.

He pauses before replying, thumbs hovering over the screen. If Xiao Zhan says that it’s no issue, then there goes the easy excuse for them to meet up again. He kind of wants to keep that excuse.

[xiao zhan]  
_I would say it’s no problem, but I don’t doubt that you can afford it._

[xiao zhan]  
_So, pay up wang yibo._

It comes across casual and friendly enough, he hopes. When Yibo sends back a sticker of him laughing with little ‘ha’ characters floating around his face, something taken from that CCTV 3 show that Xiao Zhan watches, Xiao Zhan feels an inordinate amount of relief.

[wang tian tian]  
_ill treat you to dinner  
tell me when you’re free_

Xiao Zhan stares at his screen for a moment. They used to treat each other to dinner when they’d meet up, taking it in turns to pay for the meal each time to save the age-old argument of ‘eldest pays’ vs. ‘youngest treats the eldest’. Xiao Zhan can’t remember who bought the last meal before they lost touch, but the idea of it being him, that Yibo is reigniting an old tradition by offering to pay for this one, warms him. 

Xiao Zhan closes the bakery on Thursdays and tells Yibo as much. He immediately gets a response.

[wang tian tian]  
_this thursday 8pm?  
i can pick you up_

There’s no way that Yibo just happens to be free in two days, just like there’s no way that he just ‘happened to be in the area’ today, but Xiao Zhan sends him a thumbs up sticker anyway, curious of what Yibo has to say and intrigued by the idea of them having a meal out together. 

Yibo doesn’t reply after that, and Xiao Zhan puts his phone on the bedside table, thinking. It really was strange to see Yibo, who had seemed to flit between super confident and almost as thrown off as Xiao Zhan, despite him being the one to drop in without warning. 

The whole situation reminds him of another memory, Yibo stealing his cups of tea on the set of _The Untamed_ , not even drinking the whole thing, just taking obnoxious gulps then handing it back before Xiao Zhan could say anything. He’d do the same in dressing rooms, swiping Xiao Zhan’s bottled water while he’d be caught in the flurry of brushes and make-up sponges, unable to fight back. “ _You’ll have to pay for those, one day,_ ” Xiao Zhan had said, and Yibo had turned big eyes on him, playing up the sajiao as he said to the make-up girls “ _Look at how he treats me, every day he’s like this. Xiao Zhan abuses me, a young man, this newcomer actor, taking advantage of his naivety._ ” and Xiao Zhan had laughed, loud and giggling, swiping at Yibo.

“Maybe you’ll have to order more tea, just for Wang-laoshi,” Yanjun-jie had said as she patted powder into Xiao Zhan’s temples, arching to reach him as Xiao Zhan leaned away from Yibo’s incoming fists. 

He never did order extra tea, perfectly content to let Yibo have those stolen mouthfuls. He’s content for Yibo to have a couple more.

They’re memories that Xiao Zhan holds close to his heart, for more reasons than he’d like to admit. 

He turns his face towards the pillow, smiling, and slips into a dreamless sleep.

\- - -

Yibo doesn’t message him at all in the next two days, and at quarter-to-eight Xiao Zhan has a niggling worry that he hadn’t actually been messaging Yibo, that someone else was playing a trick on him, and now he’s waiting in his locked up bakery all dressed up in his best suit shoes for no reason. 

He pulls up his WeChat and stares at the recent chats list, Yibo’s messages pushed down to the bottom of the screen but still _there_. The reassurance that it wasn’t all just a dream calms him a little and he looks out the window, watching the cars fly down the road, the street still busy with people milling about. It has always been one of Xiao Zhan’s favourite things to do, to just sit and watch people go on with their lives.

After another ten minutes, Xiao Zhan starts to feel a little like he’s been stood up for the first time in his life. When a car finally pulls up in the parking bay out of the front of the bakery he jumps to his feet eagerly. As soon as he stands his phone immediately lights up in his hand with a message. 

[wang tian tian]  
_here_

Leave it to Wang Yibo to be succinct. Xiao Zhan makes sure to set the alarm before locking the door and then shuffles into the back of the car, his knees cramped behind the driver's seat. 

After seeing what Yibo is wearing, Xiao Zhan is glad he has managed to retain a little bit of what his stylists had said over the years, that he still knows how to dress up. Yibo is in a white suit shirt, the top couple of buttons undone and revealing a little of his throat and collar bone. His jeans are tight, as usual. Xiao Zhan looks away.

“New ride?”

The cheap Didi is inconspicuous, which is better than the sleek sports car (or worse, Yibo’s _motorbike_ ) that Xiao Zhan had been imagining.

“I’d rather not be followed by anyone,” Yibo replies and tilts his head to look at Xiao Zhan, his eyes obviously trailing from his face down his body. It makes Xiao Zhan feel warm all over, to receive such direct attention from Wang Yibo. 

“I hope you’re hungry,” Yibo then says, cutting his gaze away to type rapidly on his phone. Xiao Zhan imagines that he’s begging forgiveness from his manager for blowing off whatever photoshoot or event he surely had this evening.

“I’m always hungry, Lao Wang.” 

The old nickname slips out, but it gets Yibo’s attention, eyes flicking from his phone to Xiao Zhan’s face. He then smiles.

“I remember,” he says simply, then goes back to his phone. Xiao Zhan doesn’t feel like he has the right to be irritated; Yibo is surely very busy, and he should feel lucky enough that he’s able to have dinner with him, even if he’s currently being ignored.

It still makes him feel a little antsy, though. He looks out of the window at the yellow-red street lights flying past as the night starts to take hold, ignoring the _tap-tap tap_ of Yibo’s frantic typing. 

“Sorry about that,” Yibo eventually sighs, pocketing his phone after about five minutes of silence as he typed. “They’re pushing for me to sign this new contract. I’ve said no like three times, and they keep resending it, and it’s just– ah, you don’t really want to hear about it,” he catches Xiao Zhan’s eye and smiles apologetically.

“No, it’s fine. I bet they’re missing you tonight.”

Yibo hums, non-committal. “I’ve got better things to be doing, haven’t I?”

Xiao Zhan isn’t sure if he imagines the way that Yibo’s gaze trails over him once again, the words enough to set Xiao Zhan’s mind in motion. He doesn’t want to make assumptions, but the “I just wanted to see you'' followed by an invite to dinner sends a pretty clear message in his mind. He still needs to work out what his response to that is going to be.

The thing is, they’re not in their twenties anymore. Xiao Zhan doesn’t want a no-strings-attached hookup with anyone, let alone _Wang Yibo_ , no matter how devastatingly gorgeous he may be, no matter how many close calls they had over a decade ago. The pressure of having to make that decision sits heavily on Xiao Zhan’s chest.

The journey isn’t long, but it does take them further into the city centre where the high-end restaurants are located. Xiao Zhan doesn’t feel out of place at all, but there’s some sort of dissonance within him as the car pulls up in front of their destination. It’s a little like the feeling of walking over his old footsteps, familiar but just slightly out of step, not quite fitting into the already-walked path.

The restaurant is a popular one, known for its hotpot. Xiao Zhan gives Yibo sideways glance, wondering if the choice is on purpose, but Yibo isn’t even looking at him, already walking ahead towards the doorperson. Yibo doesn’t even need to give a name before they’re led to a booth in a separate room, dimly lit and away from the other patrons. It’s been a while since Xiao Zhan has been in a private booth and he immediately misses the buzz of conversation and atmosphere from the main dining room. He slides into his seat opposite Yibo. 

The server hands them each a drinks menu and Yibo doesn’t even look at it, just cocks his eyebrow at Xiao Zhan. 

“How’s your alcohol tolerance?”

Xiao Zhan’s alcohol tolerance is awful, and it’s getting worse as he gets older. Yibo must remember this, but maybe he just wants Xiao Zhan to admit it, again with the almost inappropriate familiarity.

“It’s not bad,” Xiao Zhan lies, not wanting to give Yibo the satisfaction. “I could probably survive a beer or two.”

“Not the champagne?”

Xiao Zhan looks at the price of the champagne. Five figures, and it probably isn’t even that good.

“Not the champagne.”

“Ah, the poor life of a civilian!” Yibo laughs, and Xiao Zhan prickles. He’s not sure how much of it is teasing. “Fine, no champagne, this beer is pretty good, though.” 

They’re not offered any food menus; Yibo must have already placed an order. Xiao Zhan can’t decide if he feels like he’s being taken on a date or if Yibo is taking pity on him, but he tries to shove both of those sentiments down. Yibo is just kind.

Turns out that the beer _is_ good – it better be for the extortionate price they’re charging – and Yibo immediately orders him another bottle as soon as Xiao Zhan finishes his first, plates of meat rolls, tofu, and vegetables being bought out to surround the bowl in the centre of the table. Xiao Zhan makes sure to make the second beer last longer because he isn’t sure if he’ll survive the combo of dinner with Wang Yibo and being tipsy.

The pot isn’t split, it’s all mala broth, chilli peppers bobbing in the layer of oil on top, and it’s just how Xiao Zhan likes it. He wonders if Yibo remembers that or if it’s just another coincidence. It would be strange, he thinks, for Yibo to remember Xiao Zhan’s food preferences. Xiao Zhan remembers that Yibo couldn’t cook when he knew him, that he only knew one kind of hotpot dipping sauce, and always over seasoned things. Maybe it wouldn’t be so strange if Yibo remembered after all; they did eat out together a lot.

“How did you manage to get this evening off, then?” Xiao Zhan dares to ask as the pot reaches temperature, the broth starting to bubble. Yibo’s gaze flicks to his phone placed face down on the table.

“I didn’t, that’s why we’re hiding out here,” Yibo smirks, and Xiao Zhan resolutely holds his gaze, doesn’t allow himself to be distracted by the flirtatious tone.

“You blew off work to have dinner with me?”

“In my defence, they’ve had it coming,” Yibo’s smirk falls off his face, and he leans over to grab the plate of tofu knots that are next to Xiao Zhan. His shirt is pristine white, probably designer, and Xiao Zhan fantasises about dropping something into the hotpot so that some of the red oil splashed onto Yibo’s sleeve, staining him, ruining the shirt. 

“It’s been insane recently. This latest thing is just, if I say that they love it, you know what I mean, right?” The tofu knot goes into the pot, _swish, swish_ as Yibo stirs it in with his chopsticks. Xiao Zhan nods in agreement and adds some mushrooms to the pot. “They want me to do more and more and it’s just, ugh. Remember when I could do what I liked, and there was time off? And then there wasn’t, and it was ‘ _Just one more sponsor, just one more ambassadorship, one more half-year drama, you’ll have time after this_ ’, and it just hasn’t stopped. I haven’t stopped for years, it’s insane.”

He shoves the tofu into his mouth violently, obviously frustrated, and then some of the broth _does_ drip on his shirt. The little red spot bleeds out through the expensive weave of cotton. The orange stain is permanent proof of this evening between them, Xiao Zhan thinks. Yibo doesn’t seem to notice, continues to chew on his tofu, then takes a swig of beer.

“It can feel a little bit like you’re being chased,” Xiao Zhan agrees. He half-wishes that his time in the industry was more of a distant memory than it is, but Yibo nods enthusiastically, cheeks full.

“Exactly! Exactly like that, it’s–” 

He’s cut off by a sniff, and Xiao Zhan hones in on the action.

“Wang Yibo, can you still not handle your spice?” 

Yibo coughs weakly and takes another deep drink of his beer, now almost finished. 

“It’s a work in progress,” he admits, so _charming_ , even as he wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. It might be the beer, or maybe the giddiness of spending the night with a handsome man, with a celebrity, with _Wang Yibo_ , but Xiao Zhan’s stomach flutters. The fact that Yibo ordered spicy food for the two of them to share when it obviously isn’t his preferred style is so sweet that it’s almost out of character. 

“Speaking of works in progress,” Yibo starts, completely dropping his tirade about work, “how’s the bakery going?”

It’s not a work in progress at all; Xiao Zhan is fairly well established with _Little Rabbit_. Yibo has always had a way of saying the wrong thing, or putting his foot in his mouth, so, once again, Xiao Zhan holds his tongue. He knows that Yibo doesn’t mean to be rude – he’s always been equal parts charming and abrasive, charming in how abrasive he can be, sometimes abrasively charming.

“It’s good, really good,” Xiao Zhan says. “I know it was always more of a joke than anything else, when I said I’d go into baking, but it’s good.” 

Xiao Zhan doesn’t really want to talk about work, but he guesses it’s a fair trade since Yibo’s been talking about his work all evening. It just seems awfully mundane, to talk about waking up every day before even the birds are out, or the girls who work in the kitchen with him, or the hours spent deciding over duck-egg blue or mustard yellow for the accents in the logo. Things that are infinitely more important to Xiao Zhan than they would be to Yibo, who’s still in the star-studded world of being one of the biggest names in the entertainment industry. 

Feeling a little mischievous, and because this is the only chance Xiao Zhan is going to get, he asks something that he’s desperately been wanting to know for years, flipping the topic back over to Yibo.

“How were things, you know, after?” Xiao Zhan makes a little gesture towards Yibo’s general person. It’s not something they ever discussed together, but he’s just so _curious_ , and with the excuse of a couple of beers between them both in a private booth in the most expensive place Xiao Zhan has been in recent memory, it seems like it’s going to be the only time he can ask.

“Eh,” Yibo makes a dismissive noise and stabs at his tripe with his chopsticks, swishing it around his dipping sauce. “Like you’d expect. Lost a lot of work, gained some others,” he shoves the tripe into his mouth and talks around his mouthful. It’s a bad habit, not behaviour suitable for company, and Xiao Zhan finds himself inexplicably enamoured. He’s definitely been drinking too much too fast, and is left feeling like a teenager with a crush. “Half the industry wouldn’t touch me with a pole, the other half was desperate to have me. In the end, I guess they liked me too much to let me go, or it was the right time in ‘society’ or whatever.” 

“It must’ve been a lot,” Xiao Zhan muses. It’s one thing to come out to your family, and a totally different ballpark to come out to the nation.

“You’ve got to be strong to survive in the industry,” Yibo says dismissively, “if I couldn’t handle a few hate comments, I wouldn’t be here.” He pauses and blinks at Xiao Zhan, suddenly wide-eyed as he realises the implication of the words. “I’m sorry, that’s so rude–”

“Not at all!” Xiao Zhan waves him off. Xiao Zhan hopes that Yibo doesn’t think that ‘a few hate comments’ are what made him leave, though. “Honestly, I don’t care. Didn’t you say so yourself how I’m happier now?”

Yibo’s eyes crinkle with a genuine smile. “Mm, your face is round again,” he teases and then goes back to demolishing his food. 

“Be careful, Wang Yibo,” Xiao Zhan warns, mock threatening. “Just you wait until you’re old and your metabolism slows down, then you’ll be sorry for making fun of me!” The beer makes it easy to tease, the private booth makes it easy to relax into years-old habits. 

Yibo kicks at his leg under the table, not hard enough to hurt, but enough that the half-cooked lamb roll between Xiao Zhan’s chopsticks gets dropped back into the pot. He doesn’t move his foot back, leaves his shoe pressed to the inside of Xiao Zhan’s calf. Xiao Zhan swallows, mouth suddenly dry, stomach fluttering.

“How about you?” Yibo asks, eyes sparkling. “Are things any different for you?”

It’s a stupid question; everything’s different for Xiao Zhan. Wang Yibo doesn’t ask stupid questions, and Xiao Zhan tries to work out what he’s actually asking.

“It’s calmer?” Xiao Zhan offers, “I have an accountant.” 

Yibo smiles; once Xiao Zhan had begged him to get someone to manage his money, horrified at Yibo’s claim of spending a million yuan in a month on _shoes_. “I have friends, people who aren’t famous, some who are.”

Yibo nods, listening intently, as if Xiao Zhan’s mundane little life is interesting to him. 

“What about a wife?” he asks eagerly, and Xiao Zhan’s head whips up to look at him with wide eyes.

It’s a question Xiao Zhan has heard countless times, with even more frequency now that he’s more or less out of the public eye and _able_ to date, but it’s not a question he’d expect from Yibo. Even when they were friends they rarely talked about relationships, or women, or men, or _anything_ like that. 

“No!”

It comes out more affronted than Xiao Zhan had meant it to. Yibo just looks at him steadily, impervious to Xiao Zhan’s embarrassment as always.

“It wasn’t an accusation. I only wondered,” Yibo says, calm, as if this is not stomping over the line of everything Xiao Zhan doesn’t want to talk about. “You always said that you wanted to get married. It seems like the next step.”

Xiao Zhan forgets, sometimes, how much strangers know about him. Last year he had a customer say the same thing, she had leaned across the counter and patted his arm as if she knew him as she said ‘I thought that you had planned to be married by now, Zhan-gege’. 

Yibo isn’t really a stranger, he supposes, but they had never discussed anything like marriage. Even the idea of talking about marriage to Yibo flusters him a little – Yibo is just a _kid_. 

Except he’s not, not anymore. Yibo is years older than Xiao Zhan had been when he left entertainment, and maybe has even seen more of the world than Xiao Zhan has.

“No, I’m– there’s no wife,” Xiao Zhan stutters. 

“Oh.” Yibo takes a deep mouthful of his beer and rests his cheek on one hand. “Girlfriend?”

“No girlfriend,” Xiao Zhan takes a breath, takes the plunge. “No boyfriend either.”

“Ah.” Yibo looks surprised, then a little half-smile crooks up the side of his mouth. “I didn’t know that you like guys.”

Back in Xiao Zhan’s hotel room in Hengdian 2018, under the guise of learning their lines, Wang Yibo had pressed his nose into the space behind Xiao Zhan’s ear and said “I really like you, ge. I like you so much,” in a quiet voice, his twenty-year-old heart laid bare. Xiao Zhan had laughed and pretended he didn’t know what that meant. He’d pretended to himself that it was just a common side effect of playing a lead in a romance, to fall a little in love with your co-star. He can’t remember exactly what it was that he said in response, but he does remember the pause, heavy with anticipation, before Yibo pulled away.

Yibo hadn’t ever said it again, not in that same vulnerable whisper.

“I suppose you didn’t know because I didn’t want you to,” Xiao Zhan says, honest in his slight intoxication. Yibo looks a little hurt, his eyebrows drawing in, so Xiao Zhan rushes to clarify, “no-one knew.” That’s a lie. “Well, some people knew. But it wasn’t like I was dating.”

In the end, what difference would it have made if Yibo had known? It had been easier to let Yibo assume that he was straight, rather than telling him ‘no’. Maybe it would have made it easier for Yibo to understand the reasons why he left, but it doesn’t matter now. It hadn’t been Yibo’s business.

Yibo’s foot drags up his calf a little, reminding Xiao Zhan that it’s there.

“Well. Me too. Which, I guess you know.”

“I don’t think there's a person in China that doesn’t know.” It comes out weirdly, something bitter in Xiao Zhan’s throat, and he dips his tofu in his dipping sauce with a vengeance. Yibo laughs, comfortable despite it all. A small, selfish part of Xiao Zhan wants to ask why Yibo never said anything before, when they knew each other, so that it had been less of a shock. Maybe he had, in his own way, that night in Hengdian.

“Wang Yibo,” he sighs, leaning back in his chair. “How you shook the world with _that_ particular announcement. My mom even called me up, back then, asking if the rumours about us were true.”

Yibo takes a sip of his beer, smiling with his mouth around the lip of the bottle, It’s a small smile, almost soft. Xiao Zhan continues, “It’s just something that I wish I could have done. Made a change somehow. Done good for the world.”

“I think you did. You have,” Yibo says, his bottle slamming on the table as he leans in, over-earnest. “You are good.”

It’s something that Yibo has always been good at – making his compliments sound like they're as true as fact. Years ago they might’ve made him fluster, the cries of _Wow, Xiao-Laoshi! So good, Xiao-Laoshi is so talented!_ chasing him across the set. God, _that summer_. 

It’s a testament to his low alcohol tolerance that he’s already thinking of that summer with a longing that’s usually reserved for cold and lonely winter nights.

Now, though, Xiao Zhan can grin and bear the compliments. He’s well versed in the art of dodging praise.

“It’s not quite the same, I didn’t–“ _Change anything, help anyone,_ “–well. It doesn’t matter anymore, I suppose.” Xiao Zhan says and drums his fingers on the table. “Yibo, don’t take this the wrong way, but why are you here?”

Yibo looks down at the pot between them meaningfully. Xiao Zhan fixes him with a look. Yibo looks away, then his shoulders sag a little.

“I wanted to see you,” Yibo says, as if that answers everything. Maybe it does, maybe Wang Yibo is just the kind of person who turns up on an ex-coworker’s ( _ex-friend’s_ ) doorstep after years of silence, and invites himself out for dinner. He’s always had the potential to be mysterious, Xiao Zhan supposes, maybe the problem was just that he used to know Yibo too well. “Can’t I see you?”

Xiao Zhan nods. “Yes, of course you can. I just– I don’t know why you would want to, is all.”

Yibo’s foot moves against his leg in a proper caress, up and down his calf, firm. “Can I see your apartment?” Yibo asks, and _there_ it is. Yibo has never been subtle, and regardless of how much Xiao Zhan enjoys his lack of subtlety, he _can’t_ do that to himself.

The foot goes up a little higher, the toe of his shoe pressing into the sensitive back of Xiao Zhan’s knee. 

“No, I– I don’t think we should,” Xiao Zhan says, and Yibo’s expression doesn’t change. “I’m sorry, I can’t.”

“How about in a few weeks, then, when I’m not in trouble for losing three jobs?”

Xiao Zhan almost feels as if he’s being guilt-tripped, as if Yibo is saying ‘look at what I’m doing, just to spend time with you’. He warily looks at Yibo, doesn't reply for a moment when the server comes to clear their bowls and plates away. 

“Just for coffee,” Yibo insists, and Xiao Zhan gives in.

“Just for coffee,” He concedes, and Yibo grins. “Who knows why you want to, though.”

“Isn’t it enough to just want to talk to you? You’ve always been a valuable resource to me, with your profound wisdom. You can teach me how to make bread.”

“Bullshit,” Xiao Zhan laughs and accidentally knocks his foot back against Yibo’s outstretched leg. Yibo is smiling at him.

“Are you ready to go?” Xiao Zhan asks after Yibo seems to have been smiling at him for just a little too long. 

“There’s a Didi waiting for you back downstairs,” Yibo says, “I’m going for a walk.”

It’s a dismissal, and Xiao Zhan wonders if Yibo’s ego is bruised by his rejection. “Who are you, and what have you done with Wang Yibo?” Xiao Zhan asks, teasing. “A walk?”

“I’ve got a few phone calls to make,” Yibo says with an air of mystery. He pays the bill and walks Xiao Zhan to the door, steadier on his feet than Xiao Zhan is. They pause for a moment in front of the car pulled up out the front, and Xiao Zhan wonders if Yibo had just paid for it to idle here the entire time, since he hadn’t been on the phone at all throughout the meal.

“Well, thanks,” Xiao Zhan says, taking a step towards the car. Yibo grasps him by the elbow, and for a moment Xiao Zhan thinks that he’s going to kiss him there on the street, in his stained suit shirt. His heartbeat skitters in his chest.

“Thank you,” Yibo says instead and withdraws his hand, slowly as if he has to force it. “For your time, and for indulging me.” 

Xiao Zhan feels as if he’s been indulged a little, too; been allowed a quick look into a long history of might-have-beens. He dips his head and enters the car, doesn’t look back. It feels very much like Wang Yibo to part in this way. 

The ride home is quiet, and feels longer without Yibo there, even if he hadn’t spoken for most of the original journey. The pleasant buzz that Xiao Zhan had been feeling earlier has stagnated, leaving him feeling overtired and irritable. The driver slams on the breaks outside of the bakery and Xiao Zhan clucks his tongue, sliding out of the car. He pays for the Didi, feeling a little put out that Yibo hasn't already covered it.

His bedroom feels oppressively quiet that night, and Xiao Zhan wishes that he had said yes to Yibo, let him fuck up everything between them that ever was and ever would be, but at least then he’d _know_. He turns towards his pillow, exhaling noisily as he pushes the plush material into his face, frustrated.

Fuck Wang Yibo for making him feel like this, and fuck himself for being so goddamned cowardly, all these years later.

\- - -

It’s late afternoon, and the last of the sun is slanting in through Xiao Zhan’s lounge window, casting golden streaks across the carpeted floor. It shines into Xiao Zhan’s eyes as he sits curled on his couch, waiting for Wang Yibo to message him to say he’s arrived. 

The past few weeks had passed as usual, with nothing of excitement to note. Xiao Zhan had paid extra attention to his Wednesday night viewing, watching Yibo smoothly charm his guests as they talked about the particular fish found in their local river up north. He seems like a different person in reality, which is true of all people in the public eye, but Yibo used to present an image much closer to his true self than this one. If Xiao Zhan was feeling generous, he’d say he seems more mature on camera, but he’s not feeling generous today, because Yibo is late, so he just thinks he looks _tired_.

Yibo had said he’d be over at 4 p.m. and it’s now twenty-past, which Xiao Zhan tries not to feel too irritated at. Yibo probably has many more engagements and responsibilities to fill that come before popping in to an old friend’s for a chat. 

He is late, though.

Xiao Zhan is at the top of the stairs and just about to go downstairs to wait for Yibo, when he hears a call of “Boss!” and Lu Junyi pokes her head up the stairs, looking rather panicked as she wrings her hands, her work apron dusted with flour. “You’ve got a, um, a visitor.”

Yibo’s head pops up behind Junyi, towering over her comically as he peers up the stairway, “Oi, Xiao Zhan! I hope you didn’t forget about me!”

Xiao Zhan feels a grin split his face without his permission, irritation dissipating. “Wang Yibo, you’re late. Come on up!” He greets from the top of the stairs, and Junyi’s eyes go wide behind her glasses. “Thanks, Junyi, you’ll be okay to lock up tonight, right?”

Junyi nods rapidly, stepping to the side to let Yibo up the stairs. “Yes, of course!” Yibo gives her a small nod, barely glancing in her direction as he makes his way up the stairs to Xiao Zhan’s apartment. He takes the stairs two at a time, his long legs stretching, and he ends up in Xiao Zhan’s space far quicker than he’s expecting. 

“Hello,” Yibo greets, and his cologne is all cedar today. It’s a little overpowering and brings back memories of the horrendous _Chanel Bleu_ he always used to wear. Junyi is still hovering at the bottom of the stairs, and when Xiao Zhan turns away from Yibo to look back at her she quickly snaps to attention.

“I’ll see you later then, boss!”

The door slams behind her and then they are alone out the front of Xiao Zhan’s little apartment.

“It’s not much,” Xiao Zhan warns as he steps through the front door, entering his living room with Yibo close behind.

“Have you seen my place?” Yibo jokes, toeing off his shoes just behind the door. “I don’t think there’s a single piece of furniture there that didn’t come with it. Yours is going to be much better, trust me.”

Xiao Zhan’s home is full of knick-knacks; he hadn't been able to kick the habit of collecting useless things despite the years of moving around from hotel to hotel. The couch is covered in decorative cushions and a couple of plush toys that are too big to store in the bedroom, and he tries not to be embarrassed when Yibo lopes into the room and pokes the head of the bear perched at the top of the pile, his finger disappearing into the thick, fluffy material. There’s no room for Yibo to sit down without moving things, and he hovers in the middle of the room.

“I don’t get many guests,” Xiao Zhan explains apologetically, shoving the cushions and toys to one side to make room for Yibo and himself.

“No?” Yibo asks. “I suppose you don’t get much time to socialise.”

“Mm, well, I do have my wild Thursdays,” Xiao Zhan waggles his fingers, mimicking confetti falling. “Just me and the takeout.” 

“Sounds like my days off,” Yibo laughs and collapses half on the pile of plushies, half on the couch cushions.

“Some things never change,” Xiao Zhan sits down in a more restrained way, as if he’s the guest here. The two of them sitting on his couch alone, with the view of the sky darkening outside, feels intimate all of a sudden. Yibo had said _just_ for coffee.

Yibo’s gaze on him is heavy, almost half-lidded as he sprawls out on Xiao Zhan’s couch, and Xiao Zhan springs to his feet in an act of self-preservation.

“Coffee!” He declares, escaping to his kitchen in quick strides. 

“Sure,” Yibo sounds amused, and Xiao Zhan hopes his discomfort isn’t obvious. The kitchen is only a few strides away from the lounge area, the apartment is small and open plan, but the small distance between them gives Xiao Zhan space to breathe.

He’s so _nervous_. Wang Yibo is so hot, and Xiao Zhan has always liked himself little too much, and now he’s here in his home, and he’s flirting, and he's sprawled out on Xiao Zhan’s couch like it’s his and he looks _so good_. 

He rattles around in his cupboards to find the small tin of nice coffee that he saves for guests. “It’s not as good as my downstairs coffee,” Xiao Zhan apologises, “but it’s still pretty good.”

“Whatever is fine,” Yibo says. He’s looking over the back of the couch, watching Xiao Zhan with one arm propping himself up. 

“It’s all you’re getting,” Xiao Zhan cocks an eyebrow at him, and Yibo grins wolfishly. He seems to smile more often now, Xiao Zhan thinks with fondness. He’d like to think that it’s because he’s less stressed now, less overworked, but from the little that Yibo’s said it seems that he’s currently working just as hard as ever.

Xiao Zhan grabs himself a bottle of sparkling water while he waits for the French press to get to work, unscrewing the cap and letting the bubbles pop on his tongue as he drinks straight from the bottle, a distracting sensation from Yibo’s obvious presence. He glances over to where Yibo is sitting and spots him with the plush bear now on his lap.

“You’ve got a lot of stuff.” Yibo is looking at Xiao Zhan’s dresser as he plays with the arms of the bear, which is piled high with framed photographs, a few old fan signs, and all sorts of good luck charms that he’s collected over the years. If Yibo were to look inside of the drawers he’d find a mess of fan letters and photographs, things that seemed too personal for Xiao Zhan to throw away. Maybe he will get around to clearing it out on his next move.

“I think it’s a problem,” Xiao Zhan jokes, “I’m like those hoarders you hear about, I can’t get rid of anything.”

Yibo nods, and looks back over to Xiao Zhan, lolling his head over the back of the couch. “It’s a good-sized space, though. I could probably live somewhere like this.”

“Why, are you moving in?” The coffee is finished, and Xiao Zhan busies himself with pouring Yibo a cup as he tries to keep his tone on that casual line between friendly banter and an actual question needing an answer. 

“Perhaps,” Yibo says, and reaches out with both hands to take the coffee from Xiao Zhan when he approaches him. “Maybe I’ll steal your identity. We can do a switch, I’ll wake up god-knows how early, and punch some bread or whatever it is you do, and you can fly back and forth every day like you’re on some kind of metronome, never ending until you die.”

It’s a bit intense, a lot dramatic, and Xiao Zhan takes another quick sip of water to hide any sign of reaction on his face. He sits down in the space next to Yibo, and their knees touch, pressed close by the pile of cushions and toys.

“That doesn’t sound all that fun, Yibo,” Xiao Zhan says, and Yibo sighs, running a hand through his hair. It’s not flattened down this time, Yibo obviously didn't come by bike.

“Sorry, I’m– shit, I’m sorry. That was a lot.”

It was, but Xiao Zhan gets it. 

“They can’t stop me from leaving,” Yibo continues. “They’re trying to, but they can’t.”

Xiao Zhan doesn’t know what to say to that, and stays silent. Yibo sighs again and turns his whole body to face Xiao Zhan, fixing him with his heavy gaze.

“You know that I was in love with you when I was twenty-one?” Yibo says then, apropos of nothing, like it’s somehow related. Xiao Zhan coughs, eyes wide. He hadn’t expected Yibo to ever say it, just like that. Especially not right now. “Maybe for a bit after that too.”

Xiao Zhan wishes he’d offered beer instead of coffee because he’s really not up for this conversation.

“Ah, I thought it was something like that,” he admits eventually, giving Yibo a guilty little look over his bottle of sparkling water. Yibo doesn’t look hurt, and Xiao Zhan supposes that after over ten years it’s a small issue in the grand scheme of things.

“And you let me just carry on?”

Xiao Zhan sighs and decides to be honest. “I was being selfish. Enjoying the attention from you.” That is too honest, he realises, displaying the soft, cowardly belly of his past self. “God, it sounds awful when I put it like that.” Yibo is looking at him, and it feels too much like exposing himself to meet his eyes. “It was nice, I mean. Fun.”

Yibo laughs a tiny laugh, “I think I knew it at the time. That you weren’t interested.”

It’s something Xiao Zhan is sure that Yibo has had to deal with for years, being rejected by other people out of fear of discovery, probably even before he came out. He knows what the industry is like. So he tries to soften the truth as much as he can.

“I didn’t say that I wasn’t interested.”

“Oh?” Yibo’s gaze turns half-lidded and one side of his mouth cocks up as he leans back, obviously aiming for seductive, and Xiao Zhan isn’t sure how much of it is a joke, how much is desperation, how much is real.

“A handsome young man all over me, it takes someone stronger than me to not be at least slightly interested,” he chuckles, but it comes out a little choked with the effort. Xiao Zhan never wanted to actually have this conversation, content to let dead dogs lie. It’s embarrassing, it’s worse still that exactly this is what cost him his career, when it wasn’t even _real_. Discussing how desperately they both would have wanted it to be real feels like a kick in the teeth, somehow. “It was work, though. And with things the way they were, there wasn’t anywhere we could have gone.” Yibo hums at this, agreeing. “I’m not the kind of person who can hide a relationship for long. You’d have gotten sick of me too. God, can you imagine? So neurotic. I’d have gotten so paranoid too.” Xiao Zhan clicks his tongue at himself, self-deprecating.

Nervous breakdowns are less frequent occurrences in Xiao Zhan’s life, but they still happen. He’d once imagined kissing Yibo – when he had kicked his feet up into Xiao Zhan’s lap and called him ‘Xiao-laoshi’, all battering eyelashes and non-stop half-joking flirtations – and had subsequently spent the evening arguing with himself over his lack of respect for his coworkers, over his lack of respect for his _career_. It happened a few more times after that, each time the voice of reason in his head getting quieter, the imagined repercussions of his thoughts getting worse. 

There would be fewer repercussions to kissing Yibo this time, maybe. 

Yibo grins, “Mm, I probably shouldn't have been tied down at twenty-one either.”

Xiao Zhan mock-gasps and kicks at Yibo’s shin. “Ha! Tied down! Is that how you view me, Wang Yibo? A tie?”

“Still neurotic, I see.” Yibo says, deadpan, and Xiao Zhan feels his heart _tug_. It’s a little terrifying, to still feel the spark of chemistry between them after all these years. “Actually, you seem well. Settled. You seem so happy.”

Xiao Zhan thinks that the Yibo of years past would have scoffed at the idea of settling down. It had been hard enough to keep him in one place for over an hour, let alone forever. Now, though, he sounds almost jealous, something about the way he says it, ‘settled’, like it’s something he’ll never get to have.

He almost wants to make a joke out of it, and ask if Yibo’s commenting on his weight, or that he knows that the flat isn’t exactly glamorous, but Yibo brings one leg up onto the couch and rests his chin on his knee, looking very serious all of a sudden. 

“I’m thinking of retiring too.”

Xiao Zhan is quiet for a moment, and Yibo doesn’t say anything else. He doesn’t really know what to say. The last few weeks seem to make more sense with this information, the cypher revealed.

“Wang Yibo, how old are you now? Thirty?”

“I’m thirty-one now, thirty-two this year.” Yibo leans back into the pile of cushions, swishing his coffee in his cup like it’s wine. “Thirty-two,” he says solemnly.

“Thirty-two isn’t when you should be retiring!” 

Yibo looks at him, and perhaps it’s a trick of the light, but he looks _tired_ , dark smudges under his eyes. “I’ve done a lot, though. I've done so much, Xiao Zhan.” The way he says it makes it sound like there are things that Xiao Zhan doesn’t know. He hadn’t even asked Yibo how he was doing.

After a moment Yibo sighs. “Ah, maybe I should just take a lead out of your book and open up a bakery.”

“Oh, don’t,” Xiao Zhan laments, trying to lighten the mood. “You'd poison everyone! So much salt!”

“I can cook now, ge. I’m not a kid anymore.” Yibo takes a large sip of his coffee, emptying it. He puts the empty cup on the floor slowly, purposefully.

Xiao Zhan looks at him, “No, you’re not.” Another memory, this time of Xiao Zhan shoving at Yibo’s shoulder, laughing _‘this kid, huh?’_ to Xuan Lu, who had given him a look, and he had just caught Yibo’s smile faltering out of the corner of his eye. It wasn’t the only time it had happened. Xiao Zhan had known it hurt Yibo, and had known exactly where to press to keep the simmering want between them at a distance before it boiled over into something catastrophic. There’s still something bubbling under his skin now, something that had lain dormant for years and it’s a dangerous thought, the one that he still has feelings other than distant friendship for Yibo.

“I searched you up on Baidu, found out where you are now,” Yibo says. “I wanted to come and see you before I made any decisions.”

“Why?” The question tumbles out of Xiao Zhan’s mouth before he has time to stop it.

“You did it.” Yibo swallows. “You left, and I had to see what it’s like afterwards. And you’re happy?” It’s not quite a question or a statement, something between the two.

Xiao Zhan nods. He is happy. Life is so different that it’s incomparable, and it’s not that he wasn’t happy before, but it’s just a different kind of happiness.

Yibo nods to himself and brings his feet up onto the couch, tucking his socked feet under his legs. “I want to tie up my loose ends, before I retire. I want it to be clean-cut.”

“And I’m a loose end?” Xiao Zhan asks, too genuine.

“Yeah. The one that got away.” It’s not a joke, Xiao Zhan realises. Yibo is really here trying to make amends over a non-existent relationship from over a decade ago. “I regret a lot of things that happened, you know.”

It was a mess, and Xiao Zhan doesn’t want to dwell on it. “You had your own things going on,” he says kindly, instead of _couldn’t you have stopped it, though?_. There are some things that aren’t worth saying.

Yibo shakes his head, “No. I should have put my foot down, but I was so–” he exhales, frustrated. Xiao Zhan knows the feeling; looking back, there are a lot of things he wishes he’d done differently. “I’m glad that you ended up here, and that you’re happy and – well, you are alone – but… It’s nice. It made me realise it’d be the right choice.”

“It might not be the right choice for you, though, Yibo,” Xiao Zhan says quietly. “We’re very different people, we’ve had very different lives.”

“That’s not your decision to make, Xiao Zhan,” Yibo says, firm. “It’s never been your decision.” 

It stings a little, poking at an old wound. They’d once had an argument, one of their only arguments in their friendship, Yibo raising his voice at him down the phone. 

_You can’t control every single aspect of everyone’s life!_ Yibo had said, on his twenty-second hour of consciousness, his fourteenth day of work without rest. _You don’t listen, not everyone is like you, some of us_ like _this job, some of us don’t want to throw it all away over_ nothing.

It had shaken Xiao Zhan to hear Yibo accuse him of not liking his job. 

In some ways, Yibo seemed to know before he did. 

“You’re right, I’m sorry,” Xiao Zhan apologises. “It’s not up to me.”

They’re quiet for a moment, and it’s verging on another awkward length when Yibo sighs and reaches over to take hold of Xiao Zhan’s hand, pulling it into the space between them. “Can I kiss you?” he asks, his voice soft and low. 

Xiao Zhan feels his heartbeat pick up, his palms sweating as if he’s some kind of teenager. Like he’s twenty-six and has a lapful of bright-eyed young man who doesn’t know when to stop pushing, who won’t stop touching him as if it means something. 

“Why?” Xiao Zhan asks helplessly. He regrets it instantly; he doesn’t want to know why Wang Yibo wants to kiss him, he wants to maintain the illusion that they were going to reconnect and become friends again and have a relationship not muddied by this confusing undercurrent of sexual tension.

Yibo cocks up one side of his mouth in a little smirk, “Tying up loose ends?”

Xiao Zhan looks at his soft, pink mouth then back up to his eyes, “I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

It’s the worst idea Xiao Zhan has heard in a long time and yet he _wants it_.

Yibo leans in a little closer, tilting his head to the side. Xiao Zhan can’t help the way he sways forward slightly. He hasn’t kissed anyone in over a year, and maybe that’s why he finds his mouth dry and his stomach full of butterflies. “Then how about because I have wanted to kiss you since I was barely out of my teens,” Yibo’s eyes are clear and genuine, still as steely as they’d always been. “Or because I like you? I like you so much, Zhan-ge.” He says the last bit in one breath, as if it’s pulled out from somewhere deep inside him.

Hearing the honorific from Yibo’s mouth after so long _aches_. “Why didn’t you stay in contact, then?” 

Xiao Zhan doesn’t mean it as a ‘no’, and Yibo – who always has been on the same wavelength as him – understands, brings one hand up to cup his face, his thumb stroking a warm trail across Xiao Zhan’s cheekbone. It’s an unfair question to ask; Xiao Zhan hadn’t exactly tried to continue their friendship after he had left the industry either.

“It seemed safer not to. I wanted you too much.” 

At twenty-one, Yibo had wanted the world and had practically had it. He always wanted more than he could have, a fire burning inside that would drive him to do more, do better, be the best. 

“And now?” 

Yibo huffs and his breath blows hot across Xiao Zhan’s mouth. “I still want you. You could have had me, back then. I could have been there.” 

It’s a fantasy; no matter what had happened that summer, nothing could have changed what happened afterwards. 

“It wouldn’t have lasted,” Xiao Zhan says, “a summer fling. Too much pressure, too many fans.” The pressure would have torn them apart, and Xiao Zhan knows what it’s like to be destroyed from the inside out. He wouldn’t have been able to handle it if he had dragged Yibo down with him. 

“I could have handled it.”

Yibo looks so earnest, so trusting. Instead of answering, Xiao Zhan closes the distance and kisses Wang Yibo for the first time.

It’s gentle, nothing like how it would have been if they had got together that summer, all full of heat and youth. Yibo exhales shakily into his mouth, breathes out through his nose, and tilts his head for a better angle. Xiao Zhan’s heart is racing, his eyes close and he makes a soft noise because it’s so _nice_ to finally kiss Yibo. Even with their lips just moving together he can picture what it would be like to have this all the time, to press early morning kisses into the crown of Yibo’s head before getting up to preheat the ovens, to laugh over shared meals like they used to back in Hengdian, to have someone in his small apartment to make it feel a little less lonely. These things are all impossible, fantasies really, but it doesn't stop Xiao Zhan from _wanting it_. 

Yibo’s mouth is plush and hot and even with just their lips pressing together, their breaths intermingling. Xiao Zhan can feel his own heartbeat in his ears.

The first brush of Yibo’s tongue is electric, sending tingles zipping up the small of Xiao Zhan’s back as he opens his mouth for him. He grabs Yibo’s free hand and laces their fingers together then slides his tongue against Yibo’s, tasting coffee and sugar. Yibo presses closer, his build sturdier now that he’s older, a little broader but still lithe, and Xiao Zhan has to tilt his head back to keep their mouths together, making a soft noise at the change in angle. Yibo pulls back and separates their mouths, then takes Xiao Zhan’s lower lip between his own, playfully nipping.

Yibo’s about to say something but Xiao Zhan doesn’t want to hear it, so he presses closer, slotting their mouths back together. Yibo’s teeth catch on his lower lip and frizzions of heat jolt low in Xiao Zhan’s belly, forcing a moan out of him. Yibo groans, his tongue lapping over Xiao Zhan’s lower lip in a filthy drag before he leans back again, out of Xiao Zhan’s reach.

“Ah,” Xiao Zhan breathes out shakily. He’s a little surprised at how good this is, but supposes he shouldn’t be; Yibo’s good at everything.

“Xiao Zhan,” Yibo whispers into the space between them, and Xiao Zhan opens his eyes. Yibo is staring back at him, eyes soft, pupils wide. It sends something long untouched skittering across his chest, crawling up the back of his throat. _Oh. Oh, this is what it would have been like_.

“Loose end all tied up?” Xiao Zhan says quietly, still feeling the ghost of Yibo’s tongue in his mouth. 

“Mm, I’m thinking that this string is a little longer than I expected, though.” Yibo tilts his head and leans in a little, their lips almost touching again. “I want to kiss you again.” 

“If you kiss me again, I don’t think I’ll want to stop,” Xiao Zhan confesses, and Yibo’s little huff of laughter blows across his face. Xiao Zhan squeezes his fingers, “I won’t want to let you go.”

“You want to keep me, ge?”

The way Yibo says it is too soft, exposed.

Xiao Zhan smiles, the corners of his eyes scrunching up. “I don’t think anyone could keep you anywhere you didn’t want to be, Wang Yibo.”

Yibo drops his head until his forehead is resting on Xiao Zhan’s shoulder. His hair smells of sweat and mint and Xiao Zhan turns his face into it, inhaling as Yibo tugs him closer with his free hand.

“I don’t know where I want to be. Here, maybe.”

It seems laughable that someone that he had a will-they-won’t-they type thing with over ten years ago would turn up unannounced on his doorstep and a month later say that it’s just where he wants to be. It’s ridiculous. It’s so typically _Yibo_ , Yibo, who never has done anything in halves.

“You’ve been thinking about it,” Xiao Zhan says, and Yibo hums an agreement. “It wouldn’t be the same as before, but I suppose you know that.”

“I wouldn’t want it to be.”

It seems like a lifetime ago. Xiao Zhan might have wanted to go back to how things used to be at some point over the years, but not anymore. He’s content, he’s dug out a space for himself in this world and he can do good for people while still being able to hold onto his sense of self and it’s good. To share that space with someone else seems like a lot.

“Would you like to try?” Yibo brings their joined hands to his mouth and kisses their intertwined knuckles. It’s more intimate than it should be, more intimate than it has any right to be. “Once things blow over. After all of this, would you like to try?”

“Are you asking me to wait for you?” Xiao Zhan teases, “Very presumptuous, Wang Yibo.”

“I think you will,” Yibo says and leans in for another kiss. This one is barely anything more than a press of lips. “One could say that you have already waited ten years, what’s another half year or so?”

It’s too much, it’s asking for too much too fast when they barely know each other any more. Xiao Zhan wants to know Yibo again with a fierce desperation.

“You think it’ll be that fast? What about your sponsorships?” Xiao Zhan tries for logic, clutching at reasons to say no.

“They’re ending soon.” Yibo counters, “I don’t have anything new coming up. I know what I’m doing, Zhan-ge.”

“You’ve already finished your contracts?” The implication that Yibo has been planning this long enough for his current contracts to end is sobering.

“You once said you wanted to be settled by thirty, with a family and all that,” Yibo says. “At the time, I thought it was silly of you, to think you’d ever want to stop. I never wanted to, it was fine, fun even, until it wasn’t. And I thought, if it’s not fun, why carry on?”

There’s a soul-deep loneliness to selling yourself as a commodity, Xiao Zhan had found. He’d thought that Yibo, with his years of idol training and the fact that he had never known anything else, wouldn’t be able to tell how lonely it is, or know what he’s missing. 

“I wondered why you were the first person I thought of when Chanel asked me to sign a three-year-long ambassadorship with them. It was stupid, I hadn’t thought about you for years and then–“ Yibo wrings his hands, “–I thought about at that last party, the one with Jackson? And, and how you’d seemed so normal. Yourself, but _more_.”

It’s nonsensical, but Xiao Zhan _gets it_.

Yibo places both palms on Xiao Zhan’s thighs, bearing his weight down as he leans in. Xiao Zhan stops him with his hand, pressing his fingertips again he Yibo’s mouth to keep him in place. Yibo darts his tongue over them, hot, seductive, and Xiao Zhan swallows. He feels so charged up, turned on. Wang Yibo _wants him_.

Yibo pulls back out of possible kissing range. Xiao Zhan lowers his hand, and Yibo looks at him, earnest. “I realised I could leave, if I wanted. No matter what anyone said, I could still leave.”

There’s a sudden chime from Yibo’s phone and he startles back, hand flying to his pocket.

Yibo groans as he swipes his phone open. “My car’s here already.”

_What is it with Wang Yibo and mysteriously calling cars without Xiao Zhan noticing?_

“Why did you book it to come now?” Xiao Zhan asks incredulously. He’s warring between arousal and disappointment and fondness, his chest feeling tight, his mouth swollen. Yibo looks similarly taken apart, staring down at the message from his driver like it personally has hurt him.

“Well, I wasn’t expecting the evening to–” Yibo cuts himself off, biting his tongue between his teeth, and Xiao Zhan feels his ears prickle with heat. Yeah, him neither. “I thought I’d be ready to leave by now.”

There’s an opening there, space for Xiao Zhan to ask Yibo to stay, god, to _spend the night_. He could, they could spend the rest of the night on Xiao Zhan couch, the pillows and plush toys thrown to the floor and forgotten. They could end up in his bed, legs tangled and sharing panting breaths until the morning alarm goes off.

God, Yibo could _fuck him_. Xiao Zhan feels like he’s going to fall apart.

“You’d better get going, then,” Xiao Zhan says, instead of begging Yibo to stay. It’s safer this way, more sensible. They’ll have time to work things out, they’ve got all the time in the world. What’s another day, or month, or _decade_? 

Yibo nods and gets to his feet, stretching his arms up over his head as he goes. His shirt rides up a little, his pale hipbone on show, and Xiao Zhan makes a noise like he’s dying. Yibo offers a hand to Xiao Zhan to pull him up off the couch, his mouth cocked up into a little half-smirk like he knows how devastated he has made Xiao Zhan, but his palm is just as sweaty as Xiao Zhan’s when he takes hold.

Xiao Zhan makes sure not to touch Yibo as they pull on their shoes then descend the stairs, feeling a little bit giddy with the excitement of their kiss, as if just their fingers brushing would cause the tension between them to snap. They make it to the dark kitchen, the bakery already locked up for the night, and are halfway across the room when Xiao Zhan pushes Yibo up against one of the worktops and kisses him again, the emergency lights casting a green glow across Yibo’s face.

Yibo immediately opens his mouth, tongue slipping against Xiao Zhan’s own, his head tilting to get a better angle. Xiao Zhan feels like he’s shaking with the things he wants, the things he might have, and he holds onto one of Yibo’s wrists just for something to occupy his hands with. Yibo holds the back of Xiao Zhan’s head with his free hand, and it’s possessive, and hot, and Xiao Zhan moans far too loudly for someone who’s just being _kissed_.

This kiss feels desperate, though, and Xiao Zhan presses up between Yibo’s legs, forcing him to half sit on the worktop as they kiss, his thighs pressed hot around Xiao Zhan’s hips. This is why they couldn’t have had this that summer, they’d have never gotten anything done. Yibo’s tongue grazes the roof of Xiao Zhan’s mouth, liquid heat coursing through him, and Xiao Zhan has to break the kiss before he does something drastic, like dropping to his knees in front of him.

Yibo pulls back. “Fuck, Zhan-ge,” he moans, his voice a low rumble. Xiao Zhan takes a step backwards, grabbing hold of Yibo’s thighs to give him something to do that isn’t grinding up against him. Yibo grunts, hips rocking up a little.

“You should go,” he says, but presses another kiss to Yibo’s mouth. Yibo bites at his lip, sucks it into his mouth, and his hands are on Xiao Zhan’s waist before he realises it, his thumbs pressing under his shirt and against the skin of his hips. Yibo is warm, and strong, and Xiao Zhan doesn’t want to stop touching him. “Mm, you really should.”

“Yeah,” Yibo sighs, then takes a deep breath, steadying himself. His thumbs rub up and down Xiao Zhan’s hips, hot trails of flame licking up his skin and making him shudder. Xiao Zhan presses his hips into the touch thoughtlessly. “I should.” 

Yibo straightens himself up and lets his hands drop down. His mouth is red, obviously kissed. Xiao Zhan’s own mouth feels tender, swollen. He’s half hard in his pants, arousal swimming through his veins. He resolutely doesn’t look below Yibo’s mouth, doesn’t want to know if he’s as affected as he is.

“Let’s go.” Yibo’s voice is crackly, and Xiao Zhan could positively _melt_ for that tone.

They walk together through the cafe floor, Yibo navigating his way around the tables with an unnerving grace for someone who has only been there twice. It had taken Xiao Zhan months to be able to get around in the dark without bashing his legs on the corners of tables.

Xiao Zhan fumbles with the key in the door and hopes that it doesn’t look like he’s intentionally trying to keep Yibo here. His hands are just shaking. Yibo stands to the side, giving him space, which Xiao Zhan appreciates, but he also wouldn’t mind if Yibo pushed him up against the wall, told him he’s staying. 

When the lock finally gives, the door opening slightly inward, Xiao Zhan pauses.

“Well, good luck,” he says. His voice is impressively steady. Yibo doesn’t smile but does duck his head a little, orange street lights beaming in through the window and catching on his hair creating a fuzzy halo. “Not that you’ll need it, of course.” If anyone was going to quit their career halfway through and escape totally unscathed, it’d be Wang Yibo.

“I’ll see you. Soon,” Yibo promises and reaches out to pull the door the rest of the way open, fingers overlapping with Xiao Zhan’s for a moment before he drops his arm, the keys held tight in his fist. 

“Take all the time you need, you know where I am.” Xiao Zhan doesn’t want to promise anything, and Yibo doesn’t ask him to. 

Yibo doesn’t say goodbye as he leaves, just lifts a hand to give Xiao Zhan a wave before he gets into the car out the front. He’s as cool as ever, as if he hasn’t just turned Xiao Zhan’s life upside-down once again, the concept of ‘After Yibo’ separating Xiao Zhan’s life now well-and-truly shattered. 

Xiao Zhan watches the car pull out with a small, lingering smile.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so much for reading!
> 
> as always find me on twitter [@kinkywrists](https://twitter.com/kinkywrists)


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